Bonfire Night

Friends and long-time readers of this blog will know that Halloween is one of my favourite holidays. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to celebrate Halloween this past October because I had choir rehearsal from 7-9 PM — right when I would have hosted a Halloween gathering. To make up for it, and in homesickness for the UK, I decided to celebrate Guy Fawkes the following week instead.

Remember, remember, the Fifth of November,The Gunpowder treason and plot,I know of no reasonWhy the Gunpowder treasonShould ever be forgot!

Guy Fawkes was a seventeenth-century terrorist who was part of a plot to assassinate King James I. He is best known for his failure to blow up Parliament on the 5th of November, 1605. Naturally, they named a holiday after him. Why not? His effigy is traditionally burned on a bonfire on November 5th — but really, it’s kind of an excuse to have a giant bonfire, lots of food, and fireworks, on what would be a rather wintry night in Britain.

November 5th was on a Wednesday this year, so I had my small gathering on November 7th. We made a fire and roasted marshmallows. I attempted to make toffee for dipping apples in (keyword: attempted). And while we didn’t have full-scale fireworks, we did have sparklers.